Saturday, May 26, 2007

Global warming - are we responsible?

I just read an article about the Earth's warming and whether we are to blame. The author attempts to push the cause of a large part of the warming issue onto nature instead of human causes, which I thought was not really responsible. Perhaps it is true that the Earth is getting warmer naturally, but we cannot deny the fact that we are indeed emitting more carbon dioxide as compared to the past, and this can be shown by the increase acidicity of the oceans and destruction of coral reefs. Emission of other greehhouse gases and the destruction of rainforests to clear land for supporting the factory farm industry also trap more heat back on our Earth. Besides global warming, we have created tremendous pollution of water and health problems from the waste of factory farmed animals raised just to satisfy our palate. Assuming global warming is a small issue and out of our control like what the author implys, there are still many more activities (linked to greenhouse gases emission) that we do which destroy Mother Earth at an alarming rate, even if the Earth doesn't give way to global warming, we could die of other issues. If no one thinks it's their fault that there is global warming and other environmental issues, we can only wait till doomsday strikes before knowing (or remain ignorant of) the impact we have caused. We are dependent on our environment, it's only wise to protect it.

You can read the letter here

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

This video at http://www.thenewsroom.com/details/318130/?c_id=20191 makes the case that we're not entirely to blame. (Note that you can embed this video - or any others - onto your site from TheNewsRoom if you want.) A noted scientist claims that global warming is mostly nature. But, you can also find scientific proof that people are at fault. I'm not sure what to think anymore.

Anonymous said...

dreamy,

Global Warming is only one part of "Environmental Destruction". Environmental Crisis is a much bigger issue than just Global Warming.

In this context I want to post a part from my article which examines the impact of Speed, Overstimulation, Consumerism and Industrialization on our Minds and Environment. Please read.

Industrial Society Destroys Mind and Environment.

The fast-paced, consumerist lifestyle of Industrial Society is causing exponential rise in psychological problems besides destroying the environment. All issues are interlinked. Our Minds cannot be peaceful when attention-spans are down to nanoseconds, microseconds and milliseconds. Our Minds cannot be peaceful if we destroy Nature.

The link between Mind and Social / Environmental-Issues.

Subject : In a fast society slow emotions become extinct.
Subject : A thinking mind cannot feel.
Subject : Scientific/ Industrial/ Financial thinking destroys the planet.
Subject : Environment can never be saved as long as cities exist.

Emotion is what we experience during gaps in our thinking.

If there are no gaps there is no emotion.

Today people are thinking all the time and are mistaking thought (words/ language) for emotion.

When society switches-over from physical work (agriculture) to mental work (scientific/ industrial/ financial/ fast visuals/ fast words ) the speed of thinking keeps on accelerating and the gaps between thinking go on decreasing.

There comes a time when there are almost no gaps.

People become incapable of experiencing/ tolerating gaps.

Emotion ends.

Man becomes machine.


A society that speeds up mentally experiences every mental slowing-down as Depression / Anxiety.

A ( travelling )society that speeds up physically experiences every physical slowing-down as Depression / Anxiety.

A society that entertains itself daily experiences every non-entertaining moment as Depression / Anxiety.


Fast visuals/ words make slow emotions extinct.

Scientific/ Industrial/ Financial thinking destroys emotional circuits.

A fast (large) society cannot feel pain / remorse / empathy.

A fast (large) society will always be cruel to Animals/ Trees/ Air/ Water/ Land and to Itself.


To read the complete article please follow any of these links :

PlanetSave

FreeInfoSociety

ePhilosopher

Corrupt

sushil_yadav

Fredrik said...

What you are talking about, Rujoon, are the ideas brought forwards by the so-called climate skeptics. Not to be confused with real skeptics (such as myself) these guys are agenda-driven and will skew science and rhetorics in all possible ways to "show" that environmentalists are wrong and stupid. Unfortunately, some of them are skilled and backed by massive financial interests (oil, anyone?) and are getting more and more attention in the media.

Another problem is that in some of the points the climate skeptics are actually right. Natural processes are definitely possible causes for some of the environmental changes we are seeing today (but not exclusively). Also, the environmentalists, including Al Gore, are nearly always using the worst-case scenario when presenting to the public. This type of scare tactics is something that will only come back and bite them in the behind as soon as their exaggerated claims are failing.

dreamy said...

I guess since we are also at fault, even if it's really a little, we can still minimise it as much as possible.

A very interesting post Sushil :)Yup I agree that global warming is just a part of environmental destruction, there are lots more ways we are destroying the earth. I also concur that we are moving too fast! When I went for a retreat last time, things just slow down, and it's definitely more relax and better for the mind. Simple living is great, but it's impossible to destroy the shopping culture now.

Yep I agree Eda, and I think it's very irresponsible, by continuing to hide the fact that we are causing destruction, it's indirectly destroying ourselves.
Scare tactics by Al Gore? You mean from the movie "an inconvenient truth"?

zweiya said...

Yes global warming is part of the nature's process, but we are also speeding up the process many times faster.

I feel there's a need to put forward the worst-case scenario to the public bcos of the the urgency of the matter. Govts all over the world tend to take their own sweet time when handling non-money related issues. And iy's not like we can press the undo button and everything will be back to normal, "the day after tomorrow" may just strike any moment. So, it's always good to do something before it's too late.

Fredrik said...

The environmentalist movement and veggie movement are agenda driven. They are also guilty of cherry picking science results which fit their agenda. Although I sympathize with their goals, I don´t believe distorting the truth is a good way to gain public trust and respect.

I haven´t seen "An Inconvenient Truth" so I cannot comment on particular details, but I know the green movement is often presenting the worst-case-scenario rather than the most likely outcome. This would be fine if they would also mention that the WCS is very unlikely, but they don´t. If this continues they will not be taken seriously among either the public nor the politicians.

The science is already on our side. Why distort it to gain cheap point which will only hurt us in the long run?

zweiya said...

Almost every situation has a worst-case scenario. Eg, how to survive if your parachute fails to open? Or how to escape from a sinking car? The point of projecting a worst-case scenario is not imagining whether it will happen or not but to make provisions for the case that it does.

Are the worst-case scenario of global warming actually over the top? I think not, recent freak weather reports around the world did prove "an inconvenient truth". I don't know about the rest of the world but at least in asia, we are bombarded with news of heavy snow, floods, high waves, heavy rainfalls, landslides, extreme heat, strong wind etc. The number of all these natural disasters are increasing and becoming more frequent. There's no end to it yet.

Everyone should be prepared for the worst, but also to prevent the worst to become a reality.

dreamy said...

I dun think anyone knows for sure what is really going to happen, but i concur with zlyrica that a worse-case scenerio helps.

Yes, I do agree veggie movement and environment movement may be cherry picking on the studies that support their causes, but so are the other industries like tobacco and meat industries. But I think, at least the former is less motivated by $ than the latter (I can't prove this though), and besides, it's for the good of this world, it won't be a bad thing to help our environment become better (no matter the extent of damage on our environment we may be causing).

Fredrik said...

"Yes, I do agree veggie movement and environment movement may be cherry picking on the studies that support their causes, but so are the other industries like tobacco and meat industries."

Are we supposed to follow the example of the meat and tobacco industry now? ;)

As long as the veggie and environmental movement are using cherry-picking tactics, they are in no position to criticize others for doing the same. We already have so much science on our side that we do not need to resort to such methods. The ends do NOT justify the means, if the ends end up alienating us from the rest of the public.

dreamy said...

Hahaha... no of course not, that will distort the facts. I was just saying, since they (meat indust) promote their side of the research studies and the veg industry promote theirs, it will still become balanced (if the studies were conducted without bias towards either side).

But even if the veg industry only show their side of the story, I think the truth of suffering animals alone is sufficient to encourage a veg diet.

Fredrik said...

True! We have so many reasons to be veg and the animal suffering one is one of the strongest. Combine this with the health, ecological and environmental arguments (no exaggerations and lies required) and we have a very strong case. There is no single action (or non-action) that will have as many and quick (and only positive) results.

Speaking of global warming, I found this link: http://gristmill.grist.org/skeptics which talks about the typical arguments used by climate skeptics and why they are mostly wrong.

dreamy said...

Very good site! I didn't know about the sea ice increasing.

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